lincoln was all about the rule of law. lincoln understood as somebody who had grown up very poor, who had only had about a year and a half of schooling, who had literally learned how to read by the light of a fireplace because his family couldn't afford candles, and lincoln understood that it is the rule of law which protects the weak. it is the rule of law which recollects the average person -- protects the average person. that without the rule of law, it is the predators, the vicious and the powerful. and so he saw what we were fighting over as the very essence of freedom and whether or not freedom would survive. and he goes to gettysburg -- this war had gotten much longer, much bloodier, much more difficult than anybody expected. everybody thought it was a 30 to 90-day war. and lincoln is having to explain to the north why is it worth this level of pain? gettysburg was the bloodiest battle of the war, three days, an enormous number of casualties on both sides. and lincoln is having to talk to people, and in virtually ev